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Cottage comeback

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Bringing a design sense home

Diving headlong into a challenging project was never an issue for Catherine Bailey and Robin Petravic. The two designers found themselves having their first child, getting to know a new town, and renovating a house—not to mention acquiring Heath Ceramics, the iconic Western pottery line—all at the same time.

Their open-minded attitude came in handy when they moved from San Francisco north to Sausalito. The house they bought—a pre-1900 cottage on the hillside above the harbor—badly needed an update. Attracted to the simple beauty of functional items in their work, they brought a similar aesthetic to their home. First, to get the most out of the view, they tore down a wall that closed off the kitchen from the dining room—leaving a central tower with cabinets on one side and the fireplace on the other. They warmed rooms with fir floors and filled spaces with modern furniture whose clean lines made the most of small quarters.

“It’s a challenge to do modern in an old house,” Bailey admits. The solution was to mix it up: a Saarinen chair next to garage-sale finds, Ikea cabinets surrounded by custom woodwork and period molding.

Surprising jolts of vivid color punctuate a mostly gray palette. The three tones of deep charcoal tile are a rich background for a vintage turquoise fireplace. In the newly terraced yard, rust-orange tile benches are brilliant against the poured-concrete raised beds and bluestone pavers.

The couple nearly doubled their space by adding a bathroom, playroom, and family room where once there had been an unfinished basement. There they brought in matte brown tiles in a larger size for the floor (a practical choice for a family with a toddler and two large black Newfoundland dogs). Avocado green paint brightens the walls; sea green Heath tile gives the bathroom an otherworldly, undersea feel.